I recently finished building a Centipede themed bartop. First time ever building a cab for someone else. This one was built to be given as a gift to a friend. Her favorite game was Centipede so the theme was obvious. I used a Raspberry Pi 3 with Retropie / Attract Mode and I'm really happy with the results. The cab boots straight into Centipede then pressing the menu button goes to the main game selection menu. I kept the controls fairly simple with a joystick, 2 action buttons, and of course a trackball. The trackball is the 2 1/4" Happ USB model. Lucian045 here on the BYOAC forum printed all my artwork for me and it turned out fantastic. I created an Attract Mode theme based off of the Centipede arcade bezel and I really like how it turned out.

I was moving along at a pretty good clip on this one and I didn't take the time to make a thread when I started and post progress updates. I decided to just make this thread after the build was done this time.

Started with this idea:

Cut out a template shape using hardboard:

Transferred the shape to the white melamine board I'm using for the sides:

Cut out the shape leaving a little extra so I can router it down to the template for a smooth edge:

Got the base cut. Had to router out a recess in the base so the trackball had the depth it needed:

Went with a metal control panel this time. Bought a piece of 16ga steel at Lowes, cut it down with a metal cutting blade on the jigsaw and bent the steel until I had the shape I wanted:

Got the holes drilled out and used small screws to attach a small piano hinge:

Painted the control panel and sanded it smooth:

Once I got the artwork applied I immediately populated it with controls:

Continuing the build:

Finally, the completed bartop:

Power on and off with the power socket switch. Volume knob.

I think I'm going with MDF from now on instead of melamine board. The melamine chips a lot and scratches easily and so I end up sanding and painting it anyway. I wanna give a shout out to Lucian045 for the awesome artwork printing. I went with the reverse printed marquee this time and I love how it turned out. I'm going to upgrade my Dream Machine marquee soon!

Beautiful bartop. How did you manage to bend that steel. I'm working with an old karate champ cab and I'd love to be able to make a replacement metal control panel. Anything I make out of wood for it doesn't quite do it justice.

Question: How did you get the square pegs for the bolts on the CP to look so damn near perfect? What did you use to make them? I see that the previous photos have round holes drilled but then in the next photo they are square and painted. It's almost as if you swapped yours out for a professionally made one. Looks legit!

Beautiful bartop. How did you manage to bend that steel. I'm working with an old karate champ cab and I'd love to be able to make a replacement metal control panel. Anything I make out of wood for it doesn't quite do it justice.

Thanks! I actually had a friend help me with that part. Basically we heated the metal up with heat gun and clamped it down to a piece of steel beam that had rounded corners, then used a dead-blow hammer to bend the metal over the beam to get the larger curve shape. For the back side that has the tight bend he used a metal brake to make the bend. I wish I had some photos of that process but we didn't take any then. I want to get one of those metal brakes. I see Harbor Freight sells one that isn't too expensive. It would be great for smaller projects like a bartop CP.

Question: How did you get the square pegs for the bolts on the CP to look so damn near perfect? What did you use to make them? I see that the previous photos have round holes drilled but then in the next photo they are square and painted. It's almost as if you swapped yours out for a professionally made one. Looks legit!

DeL

Thanks man. I just used a small file to file out the corners until they were square. If you go slow and take your time you can get a pretty nice result. Also, I never explained the screws holding down the hinge. Originally I wanted to have the hinge welded to the CP but the hinge is made out of aluminum and couldn't be welded so I marked the holes and drilled them out and used a tap & die to thread the holes. After the screws were screwed in they were grinded off on the outside. Once painted and sanded they practically disappear and the surface was smooth so you can't tell under the CP artwork.

Beautiful work. I am making a Pi based bartop also - how tough is it to modify the attract mode theme? The base theme I have seen is just a basic list of emulators, would be nice to jazz it up.

Thanks. It's actually not that bad. It's similar to making a theme in Mala. Actually, like Mala, Attract Mode doesn't call them themes. They are called layouts. This becomes important when you start looking for the folder they go in. It's a layouts folder. It's located here: /usr/local/share/attract/layouts

I started with my background image of the Centipede bezel and edited it how I wanted it to look and sized it to 1024x768 for my 4:3 monitor. Then you make the areas where you want the gamelist, marquee, video or snap transparent. That background image is saved as a png file which supports the transparencies. The layout consists of the background image and a layout .nut file. The .nut file has all the config information for the layout and this is where you have to put the coordinates for the gamelist, snap, marquee, and any other info you want to show on your layout.

Beautiful work. I am making a Pi based bartop also - how tough is it to modify the attract mode theme? The base theme I have seen is just a basic list of emulators, would be nice to jazz it up.

Thanks. It's actually not that bad. It's similar to making a theme in Mala. Actually, like Mala, Attract Mode doesn't call them themes. They are called layouts. This becomes important when you start looking for the folder they go in. It's a layouts folder. It's located here: /usr/local/share/attract/layouts

I started with my background image of the Centipede bezel and edited it how I wanted it to look and sized it to 1024x768 for my 4:3 monitor. Then you make the areas where you want the gamelist, marquee, video or snap transparent. That background image is saved as a png file which supports the transparencies. The layout consists of the background image and a layout .nut file. The .nut file has all the config information for the layout and this is where you have to put the coordinates for the gamelist, snap, marquee, and any other info you want to show on your layout.

That's one awesome looking build! The only thing that I would change is to mount that joystick deeper. Easy to do in your case, just add four nuts between the panel and the mounting plate. Unless you have very large hands.

That's one awesome looking build! The only thing that I would change is to mount that joystick deeper. Easy to do in your case, just add four nuts between the panel and the mounting plate. Unless you have very large hands.

Thanks man. I didn't really think about going with a shorter shaft or lowering it. Good idea.